


memories of you

by labocat



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, gaslighting?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-27 12:10:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17161757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/labocat/pseuds/labocat
Summary: It wasn’t supposed to be quiet, it was supposed to be screaming and calliope music, taunts and confusions, and explosions overriding it all.Instead there’s quiet, and soft sheets.





	memories of you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [track_04](https://archiveofourown.org/users/track_04/gifts).



Quiet. Everything was quiet.

It wasn’t supposed to be quiet, it was supposed to be screaming and calliope music, taunts and confusions, and explosions overriding it all.

Instead there’s quiet, and soft sheets. Familiar ones, too familiar, and when Tim opens his eyes, he’s in his flat, in his own bed, sprawled there like he’d just been sleeping off a night out. It must be three in the afternoon, with the way the sun is slanted through the curtains, what little of it that can reach to the small window in his bedroom, and he looks around, guard up. 

He doesn’t know how he got here, how they all got back from Oxford. Was this even his flat? Would this be like the hallway, trapping him here forever at the whim of whatever had caught him? 

Was he dead?

He doesn’t feel dead, not with the way his legs protest as he swings them over the side, and he thinks of how his ankle had slipped while running in the waxworks. He stands, slowly, still turning, still watching every corner as he pads to his bedroom door and into the rest of the flat.

There’s a sound from the kitchen so Tim heads there. “Jon?” he calls. Unlikely. “Martin?” Even more unlikely, but at least Martin does know where his flat is. 

He doesn’t know who he’s expecting, but it’s not for Danny to be there, cooking eggs in a cast iron pan Tim’s never seen before. He starts at the sound of Tim’s voice, then curses as his hand hits the side of the pan, immediately drawing the burnt finger up to his mouth. His eyes are laughing as he turns around, a shared joke with Tim, and the thought comes to Tim’s mind that the scene is familiar. Even though he’d just switched over from sailing to cooking as his newest hobby, even though Tim had given him potholders when Danny had said he wanted to try cast iron cooking, he always forgot to use them.

“How many times until you learn?” Tim walks over and pulls the potholders out of the drawer, in a drawer he’s never used for anything else, then whaps Danny over the head with them. 

“Hey!” Danny laughs anyway and doesn’t even take the potholders, simply dancing away from Tim’s arm and the action feels so painfully familiar in his memory but his body is behind. The last time they did this must have been longer ago than he thought. He’s glad Danny moved to London, that they can spend more time together. Even if Danny spends more time at Tim’s apartment than his own, and even though Tim can’t quite recall where Danny’s apartment is at this moment. 

It’s not important, what’s important is the way the sun hit’s Danny, reflects off of him, vibrant and alive in Tim’s kitchen, There’s a niggling unease at the back of Tim’s mind, but he pushes it back as simply that he can’t remember how he got home from Oxford. It must have been Daisy, unhinged but the most competent of them, and he can always ask when he goes in to work. For now there is Danny in his kitchen, making him eggs like he’d never been abroad, like Tim hadn’t seen him in four years until just recently. But none of that matters now, not with Danny bumping Tim’s hip with his own as he passes. 

“Set the table, it’ll be ready in a sec.”

“Why _are_ you making eggs at three in the afternoon?”

Danny laughs at him, and Tim’s heart gives an unexpected lurch. “Well, you had a big day yesterday, didn’t you?”

His eyes meet Tim’s once again, and Tim has the feeling that Danny is searching for something, but what he doesn’t know. “I guess you could say that. But I’m here now, so not that big after all.” If he made it home, nothing could have gone that wrong; it must have all been okay, but if he can hide his Archive dealings from Danny for a little while longer, that’s fine. He doesn’t want his little brother dragged into that world.

There’s enough of a chance he’ll end up there anyway without Tim’s interference.

Whatever Danny’s looking for in Tim’s eyes, he finds. He nods with a grin, the one Tim remembers from the gym membership campaign, the one that felt more practiced, but as he watches, as he keeps eye contact, it melts into something more comfortable, more familiar in his mind. Danny had never been able to hide from him, and it settles something in Tim, to see Danny comfortable in his flat. 

“Nothing big at all,” he repeats. “I’m ready for those eggs when you are.” 

Tim sets the table, finding placemats and napkin rings from vacations that suddenly come to mind as soon as he sees them. Everything is ready by the time Danny brings the plates over to the table, sliding maybe closer behind Tim than the space dictates, but Tim doesn’t think anything of it. Danny has always been physically affectionate, and it is a lazy day.

“So, are you going in to work today? Will I get to see you, or are you going to disappear until tomorrow?” Tim can tell Danny is teasing, but there’s a slight note of concern, and Tim thinks back on all the late nights he’s worked, the days that Danny had left dinner waiting for him, fallen asleep on the couch by the TV, and Tim had had to tuck a blanket around him, not wanting to disturb his sleep. 

If asked previously, he would have said he’d spent more time at home than the Institute these past months, but if Danny had been waiting, then Tim must be remembering wrong. 

“Probably tomorrow. They can wait.” He flashes Danny a sideways grin, the small one he always saved for their inside jokes. Danny takes a moment to respond to it, which makes Tim think he really has spent too much time at the Institute, no matter what he may think about avoiding it recently. Nothing else would make Danny act so distant.

“Good. I have you all to myself then.” Danny laughs and wraps his arms around Tim, tugging him into a familiar hug.

“All yours to poison, you mean.” Danny’s only taken up cooking for a couple months now, and while Tim always teases him about experiments and new ingredients, he appreciates it more than anything. The takeout boxes in the fridge must be Danny’s, trying out new combinations and recipes to test on Tim.

They finish their lunch-- snack? -- in easy silence, Tim asking for hot sauce for his eggs and Danny resolutely refusing, as they always do, telling him to just try it plain, even though Tim can’t remember ever buying a bottle of hot sauce in his life. Danny must have always brought it. 

Once they finish, he wants to text Martin, to find out how things have gone, to find out what happened and how he got home, if everyone else got back okay, but the minute he glances up, he knows the face Danny will give him if he realizes he’s texting about work. It’s because it’s his off hours, and neither of them get enough of that, he knows. Danny has always liked his attention, has always been jealous in a way Tim was never, but he supposes it comes with being the older sibling, that sense of taking pride in your brother’s accomplishments, rather than coveting their time for yourself. 

He doesn’t want Danny to feel worse, not after he likely showed up on his own doorstep in rough shape, so he sets his phone down before he even opens the text chain with Martin.

The plates are cleared and Danny washes up, bemoaning as he always does that Tim doesn’t have a dishwasher, and, as always, Tim laughs and whacks Danny with the drying towel. Danny gives him a coy sideways look that is unfamiliar and then familiar the moment Danny’s eyes meet his.

Once everything is dry, Danny tugs Tim back towards the bedroom, pressing up against him, and before Tim can think to step back automatically, he remembers: lazy afternoons like this, both of them curled about the other, spending what time they can catch. Before Tim goes to work, before Danny goes off on his next expedition, before either of them are pulled down by the tides of life. 

He sinks into Danny’s embrace and remembers. He remembers days he hadn’t before and holds the memories close, because Danny is here with him. Tomorrow there will be work, but for now there is peace. His brother is home.


End file.
